It’s bad enough that we have to deal with potholes, the moldy remainder of last fall’s leaves and the sand from winter de-icing. The trash along our roadways is everywhere.

As one Chronicle letter writer, Judy Hommes of Zeeland, put it about a stretch of U.S. 31, “It looked like a garbage truck exploded and threw litter all along the roadside.”

She was writing to compliment the group of people who picked up the mess during the annual Adopt-A-Highway cleanup April 17.

“I don’t know who was responsible for picking up the litter but it looks wonderful. I would like to commend the workers for making our highway look neat and clean,” she wrote.

The Chronicle reported April 22, that one of the groups that picked up trash between VanWagoner and Sternberg roads, most of the stretch Hommes was referring to in her letter, worked for six hours and filled 120 bags with trash. No little feat and one that should be commended.

And they weren’t alone.

For 20 years, volunteers have been picking up other people’s trash three times a year along more than 6,390 miles of highways in Michigan. They have saved the state $1.5 million annually, which over 20 years is starting to add up to big bucks.

In Muskegon, Oceana and Newaygo counties, there are 80 adoptable stretches of highway. Only one does not have a group currently assigned to it, according to the Michigan Department of Transportation. Many of the two-mile stretches of roadway have had the same group of cleaner-uppers for nearly 20 years.

And it shows. Area residents can take pride in the cleanliness of our roadsides during spring, summer and fall, when the annual trash cleanups take place. According to the state, the spring cleanup is always the toughest.

The Adopt-A-Highway program has gone from 24 organizations cleaning the roadways in 1990 to more than 2,800 last year. And that’s important for a state like Michigan, where tourism annually ranks in the top three industries in the state.

It’s also important for a state like Michigan where most visitors drive to their destinations. Nothing reflects more poorly on an area than a lot of trash blowing around, especially after you’ve invited visitors to “see” and “enjoy” the scenery.

Michigan has a long history of working to eliminate roadside trash. The state was the first in the nation to place deposits on carbonated beverage containers in 1978, which made a huge difference in the amount of litter found on our streets.

Occasionally, lawmakers talk about extending deposits to bottled water, sport drink and other noncarbonated beverage containers. While that idea has merit, the Chronicle Editorial Board continues to urge the state to expand all recycling laws, creating incentives to recycle, and making it easier for people and businesses to participate.

In the meantime, the Editorial Board would like to extend its thanks to the organizations and individuals who work hard to keep our roadsides beautiful. It’s a dirty job and we appreciate that you’re doing it.

The pride you take in keeping your two-mile section litter-free is admirable. One Adopt-A-Highway participant told a Chronicle reporter that sometimes he’ll stop to pick up litter inbetween the official collection dates.

We also urge the rest of our residents to be considerate of these efforts and of our environment.

We second what our letter writer, Judy Hommes, wrote, “Now if Joe Public would do their part to keep it looking that way! If everyone would be responsible for their own litter, we could have highways that we are proud of.”